The National gets ready to play show in Asheville, NC

Thursday

Earlier this year, at the ceremony in New York City, the Cincinnati-based rock band The National won its first Grammy Award.

Only one member, bassist Scott Devendorf, was on hand to accept the award.

His brother, drummer Bryan, offered up an easy reason on his decision to opt out of attending the show. It didn’t make sense to travel, he said, and he didn’t think the band would win the award.

It did, though, as The National took home Best Alternative Album for 2017’s “Sleep Well Beast.”

“It wasn’t really something we set out to do so it wasn’t like we were striving to win it. What was more special for me was the fact we stayed together long enough to win one,” Bryan Devendorf said. “Every artist craves validation and that’s a big form of it. It’s not something we set out to do or anticipated doing ever. It was a nice surprise.”

The Devendorf brothers, along with Matt Berninger (vocals) and brothers Bryce (guitar) and Aaron Dessner (guitar, keyboards), have played together since 1999 and have released seven records. The indie rock band, which performs at 8 p.m. Friday at the U.S. Cellular Center in Asheville, N.C., was also nominated for a Grammy in 2013. Along with its Grammy Award the band has seen success from several of its records. Boxer, which was released in 2007, was highly acclaimed and was named the top album of the year by Paste magazine. Each of their past three albums have climbed inside the top three on the Billboard charts.

Two songs from last year’s record, “The System Only Dreams in Total Darkness” and “Day I Die,” cracked the adult alternative songs’ top 10 with the former going to No. 1.

Devendorf said the band has worked on some new music and hopes to have a new album out next year. Some of the songs have been played live, but the group opted to rewrite those songs, he said.

“We’re getting away from the guitar-bass-drum world and even in that world our sound has become more defined,” he said.

The band’s members have worked on individual projects in recent months but they did a two-night event in Cincinnati last weekend. On one night the group played “Boxer” in its entirety.

It was the second time The National had given the album this type of live treatment. The other was in Brussels, Belgium.

“We liked it then and because we’re in Cincinnati and we’re coming back and this is our first big show here in a long time,” Devendorf said. “We had to mix it up somehow. It’s like a trendy thing to do for bands these days and we’re just jumping on the bandwagon.”

One of Devendorf’s side projects in recent years was playing with Grateful Dead guitarist and singer Bob Weir.

Devendorf said he only saw seven or eight Dead shows in early-90s but has always enjoyed the group’s music.

“In a nutshell, to use a Bob term, it was ‘serious fun,’” he said of the experience. “It was one of the highlights of my life.”

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